Immediately after returning to town with the body of M in tow, the party visited the Holy Temple of the Mother. After some debate, they parted with 1,200 of their hard-earned gold coins and had M the Elf restored to life by the High Priestess Vaklo. They then rested a few days and returned to the Caves yet again.

The party continued exploring the southern reaches of the Caves of Woe, first investigating what they surmised was the quarters of the head Druid, killed previously while in bear form. While exploring the room, M looked behind a curious tapestry depicting naught but a dungeon door, and spied some runes on the wall. A glance was all it took – the runes exploded, injuring M but also Garros, who was nearby. A set of three ceramic urns in front of the tapestry did not fare well – they shattered, spraying their contents – gold coins, but also bits of parchment, a scroll now irretrievably lost. M applied a healing poultice and rested, soon feeling a bit better. The party decided to press on. They moved south, Garros scouting ahead as usual. When he got to some previously explored jail cells, he heard fluttering sounds and looking up, saw perhaps dozens of stirges. He backed away, leaving the room and rejoining the party. The companions hatched a clever but dangerous plan to trap the stirges in the room just to the north, by using Garros as bait, with the party waiting at an adjoining door, ready to close it as soon as Garros ran through. Amazingly, the plan worked – Garros ran to safety just in the nick of time, 22 stirges in tow. The angry stirges pecked at the door, while unbeknownst to them, the door behind them closed!

With the threat from above safely trapped, the party explored west and came to a T-intersection. Straight ahead, a portcullis barred their way into a dark room beyond. The portcullis was stubborn – it took three of the party to open it, but they did finally, wedging it halfway up. When they entered, their torchlight exposed a horrifying sight. The body of Aelzef, their long-lost porter. He had clearly died of thirst while trapped within the room. Across from him, some 20 feet away, a skeleton wearing a heavily jeweled necklace lay propped in the corner. Garros cursed his luck as when he approached it, the skeleton exploded, wounding him. The necklace was nowhere to be found.

The party continued on, heading south, past an eastern corridor and into some natural tunnels. The air was heavy with moisture here, and water could be heard dripping in the distance from the unseen reaches of a cavern visible straight ahead. Inside the floor was thick with mud – up to Garros’ knees – and there were large, man-sized mushrooms scattered about the room. As the party debated the merits of continuing on, they were attacked by 4 giant toads, emerging from the corridor they had just passed! The toads put up a good fight, almost swallowing Stavros whole, but were no match for the now angry party.

Note: We stopped here for the night, this is continued with Session #16.